A data services hierarchy of needs:  how should we build a National Data Library?

For good reasons, numerous investments have been made in different infrastructures in the UK to support often specialist, discipline-led discovery, access and use of different data resources. At the same time, the data infrastructure landscape has become busy and fragmented.

Yet the use of data created from a range of sectors now regularly straddles traditional academic topics. The pandemic highlighted the importance of ready access to a range of linked economic, environmental, health and social data. No single source of data can absolutely answer a research question (if it ever could). Despite the increasing availability of data, our Future Data Services (FDS) review describes how finding and accessing data is now more complex for the researcher. How should the existing data infrastructure landscape evolve to smooth this experience for researchers?

The new UK government’s manifesto referenced the creation of a ‘National Data Library’ (NDL). Can this provide a solution to the fragmented landscape described above? How might it build upon the infrastructures we have been investing in for years? How could it address the challenges that our review documented, such as the need for closer connections between existing infrastructures that support the federation of data services?

We describe a progressive approach to data infrastructure development, modelled as a ‘hierarchy of needs’. Assessing the core components to make data discoverable and accessible allows us to evaluate additional services, and the need for greater innovative capacity and maturity. From this assessment, a vision for an NDL becomes apparent.

Our model allows us to frame our ambition for a federated data service landscape and helps us monitor our progress to achieving this goal. The aim is to simplify the journey for researchers. After all, "the only thing that you absolutely have to know, is the location of the library." (Einstein).